He is probably the best male seiyuu who can voice a female character. In anime, of course. But the characters are not exactly female because they are actually the cross-dressing female version of the original character.
In Working!!, he voiced the protagonist, Takanashi Souta, a male worker in a family restaurant. In one of the episodes, his character had to dress up as a female version of himself, fondly called by the other characters as Kotori (a play of the kanji of the character’s name). His voice switched to a feminine and cute tone as Kotori-chan.
Takanashi Souta Kotori-chan
The cuteness climaxed to episode 13 with the scene below and Jun Fukuyama just couldn’t resist the adlib for which he is so popularly known for. Personally. I think the adlib brought the cuteness to this scene… don’t blink your ears… he said something really cute here.)
In Ixion Saga DT, who would have thought that Mariandale, one of the main characters in the anime, is voiced by a male seiyuu? Jun Fukuyama played out the character so well that anyone who is not familiar with his voice would definitely think he is a she. In fact, in one of the live events of the anime, Mariandale’s seiyuu was part of a “guess who” contest to promote the anime series. Of course, Fukuyama fans guessed correctly, but some of the outrageous and hilarious response include “Panda”, which was in fact, one of Jun Fukuyama’s characters in another anime. This became a Fukuyama-Fan-Joke during the event.
In MM!, he also voiced the cross-dressing version of his character, Sado Tarou. But this character was a comical cross-dresser so he did not transform in a feminine voice until the later part of episode 12, just a very short bit part, so better not blink. Still…
In Princess Princess, Fukuyama voiced one of the main character, Kouno Toru, who also cross-dressed as a princess, being one of the title characters. He did not switch to a feminine voice at the beginning of the anime but in later episodes (#4 onwards), he became a more convincing princess than Paku Romi’s character.
In Osomatsu-San, he voiced the female parody version of Ichimatsu. The character is called Ichiko in this anime. He seriously pulled-off a sinister feminine version of Ichimatsu. This time, Ichiko is not a cross-dressing female version but a parody female version, meaning, an alternate story is made within the anime’s episodes where the male characters have alternate female characters.
Well, I look forward to other characters he will voice in the future. For now, his works are really very much impressive that I can’t find any other comparison among other male seiyuus. Although, I think it is quite interesting to note how Morikawa Toshiyuki voiced a very convincing Panda Mama, who is the mother of the character voiced by Jun Fukuyama, Panda, in Shirokuma Cafe. But I don’t have time to write it here. Maybe I will write it in another article in the future. Just maybe…
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